According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), 29 U.S. states have seen high levels of influenza so far this season, and an additional nine states are reporting moderate levels. As public health officials previously forecast, that makes the current flu season a particularly early and active one.

Nevertheless, well less than half of Americans are getting their flu shots, despite some of the potentially fatal risks of complications from influenza:

“Influenza causes death often through its complications,” said Lyn Finelli, who tracks flu for the CDC. “Especially in the elderly, influenza causes death through pneumonia and through exacerbation of chronic underlying conditions.”

Eighteen children have died from influenza-related illnesses since the flu season began.

“It’s an extremely early flu season,” said Finelli. “In fact, we’re about five weeks ahead of schedule this year.”

Since 2010, the CDC has recommended flu shots for everyone over the age of six months. Yet only 37 percent of Americans have been vaccinated this season, which is about average.

Last year, an estimated 42 percent of Americans received their flu vaccinations, roughly keeping in line with historical trends. Part of the problem may stem from the fact that low-income Americans can’t always access affordable flu vaccinations, an issue that could be addressed by allowing more local pharmacies to provide vaccinations. Thanks to Obamacare, annual flu shots are now designated as free preventative services for elderly Americans under Medicare, a group that is at high risk for infection.

But a larger — and more inscrutable — roadblock might be Americans’ ambivalence towards vaccinations in general. A Harvard study during the 2009-2010 swine flu pandemic showed that a full 58 percent of Americans either flat out refused to get vaccinated or were unsure of whether or not they would get vaccinated. The reticence arose from false perceptions of vaccines as potentially dangerous, disease-causing medical tools.

In reality, getting the flu vaccine does not result in being infected with influenza, and health care professionals agree that getting a flu vaccine is the number one way to prevent infection.

Not long after the owner of the Olive Garden and Red Lobster chains admitted their anti-Obamacare campaigns hurt more than helped, the owner of a Wendy’s franchise in Omaha, Nebraska plans to cut 300 employees’ hours to part-time to avoid providing them health care coverage.

By moving workers to part-time status in order to avoid paying for their health benefits, the Wendy’s franchise would shift the costs of insurance coverage onto hundreds of employees:

The company has announced that all non-management positions will have their hours reduced to 28 a week. Gary Burdette, vice president of operations for the local franchise, says the cuts are coming because the new Affordable Health Care Act requires employers to offer health insurance to employees working 32-38 hours a week. Under the current law they are not considered full time and that as a small business owner, he can’t afford to stay in operation and pay for everyone’s health insurance.

But anecdotal evidence suggests this strategy may backfire on the Omaha Wendy’s operations. This fall, Denny’s quickly distanced itself from a franchisee’s similar ploy, while Darden Restaurants saw a sharp 37 percent drop in profit after threatening to cut workers to part-time.

Heaping blame on Obamacare may be a popular tactic among the fast food industry, but it is a misleading one. According to the Urban Institute, Obamacare has a negligible impact on business costs, leaving large companies virtually unaffected while actually reducing costs for small businesses.

When Texas intentionally dismantled its women’s health program by refusing to fund Planned Parenthood — the largest women’s health group in the country — the state was essentially telling poor women they would need to find new doctors. Thousands of Texan women are now searching for a new provider, but the state is doing a predictably terrible job of helping them find one.

In fact, the list of doctors provided by the state is so flawed that it may make it harder, not easier, for women to seek care. Texas officials launched a new website to help women find new providers, but the Waco Tribune-Herald “found many of the doctors aren’t actually participating or won’t take new patients through the program.” And that was only one of the many problems they uncovered with the state’s list:

For example, Waco Cardiology Associates is included on the list. But an official at the heart doctors’ office said they obviously are not participants in the program. The program’s key services include contraceptives, cervical cancer screenings and sexually transmitted disease screening and treatment, none of which are offered at Waco Cardiology Associates.

The list generated by the state’s website also includes a handful of emergency medicine physicians from Waco’s two hospitals.

Although such doctors theoretically could handle family planning needs, neither hospital wants to encourage women to seek that type of care in an expensive emergency setting.

The list also includes a few physicians who either no longer work in Waco or who have changed specialties. For example, one physician who used to practice family medicine is on the list, even though she now only does wound care work.

Linda Edwards Gockel, a spokeswoman for the Texas Health and Human Services Commission, said the state will work to correct errors on the list.

This follows Texas’ officials generally ignorant line of thinking regarding women’s health. As Gov. Rick Perry (R) has championed defunding Planned Parenthood clinics, he’s suggested that women seek care at crisis pregnancy centers, right-wing anti-abortion organizations that don’t actually provide health services.

Unfortunately, the fact that many doctors’ offices are already too full with patients to take on additional women in the program was a predicted outcome. With Planned Parenthood not an option, and other clinics forced to close thanks to budget cuts to family planning services, providers in the state have taken on an estimated five times the number of their regular patient load.

Americans believe obesity is a more pressing public health issue than smoking — but, according to a new poll, that doesn’t mean Americans can correctly identify the host of public health risks associated with the nation’s obesity epidemic.

According to a poll conducted by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, Americans can correctly identify that heart disease and diabetes are related to obesity. But, despite the extensive public health campaigns attempting to address the United States’ soaring rates of obesity, Americans are largely unaware of the other consequences:

Only 7 percent of people surveyed mentioned cancer, although doctors long have known that fat increases the risk of developing cancers of the colon, breast, prostate, uterus and certain other sites. Plus, being overweight can make it harder to spot tumors early and to treat them.

Then there’s the toll on your joints, especially the knees. About 15 percent of people knew obesity can contribute to arthritis, a vicious cycle as the joint pain then makes it harder to exercise and shed pounds.

High blood pressure, high cholesterol and strokes were fairly low on the list. Infertility didn’t get a mention.

“People are often shocked to hear how far-reaching the effects of obesity are,” Jennifer Dimitriou, a dietitian who specializes in obesity issues, told ABC News. Dimitriou pointed out that knowing more about the risk factors could encourage Americans to take steps to address their health before they’re faced with a bigger issue, such as developing Type 2 diabetes or having a heart attack.

Addressing health issues related to obesity currently accounts for 21 percent of the country’s health care spending, and that figure could rise rapidly over the next several decades. A majority of the adult population in all 50 states is now overweight or obese — and in some states like West Virginia and Mississippi, that rate is approaching 70 percent of all adults — and roughly 42 percent of all Americans are projected to be obese by 2030.

Many Obamacare provisions are intended to protect Americans from the private insurance industry, such as measures to prevent insurers from denying coverage to Americans with pre-existing conditions and to keep rising insurance premium rates in check. Nevertheless, as the New York Times reports, some of America’s largest insurers are exploiting a lack of stringent oversight in Obamacare to hike their premiums by double-digits anyway.

Insurers like Aetna and Anthem Blue Cross are requesting rate hikes as steep as 26 percent — amounting to hundreds of dollars that Americans will be forced to pay in higher premiums every month — in states such as California and Florida, and there is little that states can currently do to stop them:

Critics, like Dave Jones, the California insurance commissioner and one of two health plan regulators in that state, said that without a federal provision giving all regulators the ability to deny excessive rate increases, some insurance companies can raise rates as much as they did before the law was enacted.

“This is business as usual,” Mr. Jones said. “It’s a huge loophole in the Affordable Care Act,” he said.

While Mr. Jones has not yet weighed in on the insurers’ most recent requests, he is pushing for a state law that will give him that authority. Without legislative action, the state can only question the basis for the high rates, sometimes resulting in the insurer withdrawing or modifying the proposed rate increase.

While Obamacare does require state regulators to review any rate increase request above 10 percent, it does not endow those regulators with any meaningful veto power. Such rate-setting policies are left to states’ discretion, and although 37 states may currently negotiate or reject insurers’ desired hikes, some states with large markets — such as California — do not have this ability.

Large insurers claim that the hikes are necessary in order to keep up with general medical inflation. But since medical inflation has actually been relatively low in recent years, this claim falls flat. Insurers may actually be raising their rates in an attempt to counteract other Obamacare consumer protection measures such as the “80/20 rule” that requires insurance companies to spend at least 80 percent of the premiums they charge on actual care rather than their profits or overhead. In 2014, Obamacare will also end the practice of medical “underwriting” — taking a consumer’s current health into consideration when setting his or her premium rates — so insurance companies may be trying to lock in higher rates on sicker Americans while they still can.

Fortunately, the 80/20 rule — which has already put over $1.5 billion in insurance rebates back in consumers’ pockets — will help ensure that Americans are refunded some of their money if the latest round of rate hikes are excessive. But the only way to ensure that Americans are not held hostage to the whims of private insurers is to expand state regulators’ ability to negotiate and control premium rates.

And lawmakers are quite aware of the discrepancy. Three years ago, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) introduced the Health Insurance Rate Authority Act of 2010 in an effort to give regulators more control over insurance rate hikes, but the bill died in committee. President Obama has also called for greater federal oversight of insurance rates.

State lawmakers will reconvene to kick off their new sessions this week, and Republican legislators are already gearing up for the new abortion restrictions they hope to introduce this year.

2012 was a banner year for attacks on reproductive freedom — according to the Guttmacher Institute, 19 states passed 42 different abortion restrictions last year, second only to the record-breaking 92 anti-abortion provisions enacted in 2011 — and anti-choice lawmakers show no sign of letting up in the new year. Even though November’s election results demonstrated that voters rejected far-right anti-abortion ideology, state legislators in the following states are moving forward with their attempts to continue restricting women’s right to choose:

– VIRGINIA: In the last days of 2012, Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell (R) quietly approved controversial health clinic rules intended to target abortion doctors and limit women’s access to reproductive services — and Republican lawmakers are prepared to further McDonnell’s anti-abortion agenda in the first days of the new year. Del. Bob Marshall (R), the legislature’s most ardent anti-choice crusader, is planning to introduce a measure to impose additional burdens to abortion access under the guise of preventing “sex-selective abortions,” as well as a provision requiring insurers to offer plans that don’t include contraceptive coverage. According to the Washington Post, another Republican lawmaker in Virginia is gearing up for a bill that would “eliminate state funding for abortions for low-income women who learn of gross fetal deformities.”

– WISCONSIN: Legislators in Wisconsin enacted three different pieces of anti-abortion legislation last year, but that’s not enough for Republicans in the state. They’re already working on a forced ultrasound bill that would attempt to shame women out of choosing to have an abortion procedure. And the anti-abortion group Wisconsin Right to Life plan to pressure lawmakers to take up legislation to ban abortions after the 20th week of pregnancy and prevent public employees from using their health insurance to cover abortion services.

– INDIANA: Two anti-abortion state lawmakers in Indiana have already authored SB 101, which would require doctors to present women with biased information about the dangers of medical abortion procedures, for consideration in the new session. The Courier-Journal reports that doctors would need to provide mentally competent women with a printed packet entitled “A Woman’s Right to Know,” which would include “detailed color photos showing the development of fetuses at two-week intervals and information regarding adoption” as well as “the risks of aborting the pregnancy versus the risks of carrying it to term.”

– TEXAS: Officials in Texas have already succeeded in defunding the Planned Parenthood clinics in their state, a policy that went into effect on the first day of 2013 and is currently forcing thousands of low-income women to find new doctors. And Gov. Rick Perry (R) — who has acknowledged that his ultimate “goal” is outlawing all access to abortion — won’t stop there. Perry is also championing a “fetal pain” bill that would ban abortions at just 20 weeks of gestation, based on the scientifically contested idea that fetuses can feel pain at that point. Similar measures in Georgia and Arizona are currently being contested in court.